What is a memory you, or a character, would like to erase?

 

My hands curled around the car’s steering wheel. My eyes prowled the road in front of me.

I was doing it. Me, Ashtyn Park, the one and only: sneaking out of the house. Well, not my house exactly, but my friend Rachel’s house.

Sneaking out of my house would be suicide. My parents had that place on lock down. I’m pretty sure they had motion detectors that set off an alarm in their bedroom if I got up to use the bathroom at night. So, sneaking out a window would probably send a bullet through my brain.

But, Rachel’s parents slept deep. With her bedroom on the bottom floor, window even to the ground, it made the perfect combination for escape. Now I could cross: “sneaking around”, off my senior bucket list.

I tossed my messy blond hair over my shoulder and giggled. It didn’t matter that I had no makeup on, or that I was in my skimpiest pajamas, nobody could touch me and not be zapped by my awesomeness. My senior year in high school was already turning out to be the best, even though I was only a day into it.

The digital clock on the dashboard read 2:14 am. It was late, or early, whichever way you looked at it. Nobody should be out at this forlorn hour, especially not me. The thought of doing something forbidden gave my stomach the butterflies.

Idaho’s ebony sky loomed overhead, warning me to go back to where I’d come from. Who knows what was lurking in the darkness. Probably black cats and murderers, just waiting for me to stop my car so they could pounce. Living in the country had many perks, but pitch black nights weren’t one of them.

I stomped on the accelerator. The car’s engine growled beneath my feet. No time to waste. I had a boyfriend to see.

A pair of dim headlights broke over a distant hill. As the headlights got closer, I squinted against the light, making them bearable to stare into. I had to make sure they weren’t familiar. With the parents I had, they would probably be out stalking the neighborhood for me already. This could be them.  To my relief, an ancient Ford truck shambled behind those old headlights, not my parent’s SUV. I was safe. For now.

Coasting through a stop sign, I turned onto the road that would take me to my boyfriend’s house. We’d planned this night a couple hours before. He’d been on board with my plan the moment I mentioned it. That’s one thing I loved about Jence: never a party pooper.

I’d told my parents I was staying at Rachel’s house. Which was true. I’d be home in the morning. Which was also true. The more simple the better. They’d launched a million questions, but in the end, I was free. With freedom came the easy choice of sneaking out to be with the one person I really wanted to be with: Jence.

I parked a hundred feet away from Jence’s house, in a field that the pivot didn’t water.  My old car hit bottom a couple times as it bounced through the deep tracks left from a tractor. My shoulder slammed into the side window. Pain shot all the way past my fingertips, and I held back a curse that rose in my throat. I would be regretting that bump at volleyball practice the next day. But nothing could dampen my sunshiny mood tonight, not even a sore shoulder. I practically glowed as I slipped out of the car and darted toward his house.

Those hundred feet in the chilled, open-air felt like an eternity. Each step brought a new crunch of dead weeds, a twist of my ankle, and the sound of unknown animals scurrying through the night. By the time I reached the grass of Jence’s yard, my heart was about to burst. I swear, those crunching weeds under my feet were as loud as a base drum. The grass provided a much softer landing. I trotted in silence toward Jence’s house, which loomed over me like a fortress, telling me to stay out. But I was the sneaky one, and I would find a way in.

I’d never been in his bedroom before. His parents were almost as strict as mine. But, according to his description, it was the third window from the corner of the house. The second window was his sister’s room, and the first window, his parents. So, I had better count my windows correctly, or else. A lava lamp would be glowing in the window sill if the coast was clear. So, I couldn’t mistake his window for another as I found the orange glow coming from the third window over.

This was too easy. Sneaking around was supposed to be harder. Riskier. Something.

My lips curled upward in the darkness. Maybe I was just that good.  

I placed my hands on the brick wall. It was rough under my fingertips, but provided a sense of comfort against the night. With my back to the wall, I ducked under the first two windows and crept as quiet as a hunting cat to the third.

Slipping my cell phone out of my back pocket, I pressed the speed dial for Jence’s phone. It rang once. Twice. Three times before he picked up and answered in a groggy voice.

Wait! My fingers turned to icicles around the phone. Answering the phone wasn’t part of our plan.

No lights were on in the house, and his lava lamp still glowed. I stayed poised under his window, waiting for a signal. Nothing happened.

“Hello?” I whispered into the phone.

“Ashtyn?” Jence’s voice sounded different, strained.  

“Yeah?” I straightened my back against the brick, afraid to be seen. Not that it would be easy to see me, there was no moon.

“What’re you doing up?”

I groaned. “I’m here.”

“Where?”

“At your house, dummy. Now open up.”

“Your house?” A slight pause. “Why are you at my house? Aren’t you at Rachel’s house tonight?” He moaned into the phone, like he was rolling over in bed.

I took a deep breath. Had I come all this way for him to forget? “Yes. Don’t you remember that I was sneaking out to see you?”

“Why are you sneaking? Mom and Dad would let you in. Wait. It’s 2:30 in the morning…” His voice trailed off. I was hoping he was putting the simple puzzle pieces together.

I started to get frustrated. We’d planned all this. It was 2:30 am on my phone’s clock and…

I gasped. The phone almost fell from my frozen fingertips.

The letters on the screen didn’t spell out the right name. Or number. The time was 2:30 am, but I’d called the wrong person. Instead of calling my boyfriend, I’d called my brother.

Ah crap. That was NOT part of ‘The Plan’.

I heard my brother’s voice through the speaker right before I hung up on him. “Ashtyn? Are you okay?”